


Season 2 episode 10: Conceal don't feel

by Heligena



Series: Season 2 Drabbles [10]
Category: Carmilla (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, F/F, unspoken sentiment
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-05
Updated: 2015-07-05
Packaged: 2018-04-07 19:34:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,001
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4275381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Heligena/pseuds/Heligena
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Season 2 episode 10 drabble.</p>
<p>I've got so many mixed feelings about this ep- I know Laura's getting a lot of hate from some sections of the fandom at the moment but she's always been headstrong and blinkered, running headlong into situations without thinking of the risks so as much as I find her attitude irksome, it totally fits with her character if you ask me.</p>
<p>And I still think she's awesome.</p>
<p>Anyways here's some angst to add to the pile.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Season 2 episode 10: Conceal don't feel

Laura tried not to think about it.  
They were doing this for a good reason. I mean, they were trying to save the campus, right?  
But despite knowing that, all that kept popping into her head was the scene in Hamlet where Polonius hid himself behind the arras and before he even had a chance to explain himself felt the sting of a rapier thrust into his belly.  
A mistake. A misunderstanding and nothing more that led to blood and searing pain.  
And death.  
That’s what she remembered about Hamlet. Just death. Everywhere. 

But they were trying to help. Trying to save lives. It wasn’t really an act of aggression. It was protection. Defence.   
Even Carmilla understood that.

But Laura’s muscles were tense as she waited there behind the curtain in their room, waiting for the pinch of steel or maybe teeth to come when Mattie figured out what they were doing.

It didn’t help of course that in the space of thirty seconds the vampire matriarch had called her a mayfly and the equivalent to a cheap sandwich from a vending machine. Every word from that smooth mouth that sounded so deafening due to the acoustics in the room felt like it was designed to sting her skin. To remind her that she was little more than an annoyance, a way to pass the time for an hour or two.

And the worst part about it was that they did. Sting.  
Trying to keep her trembling hands from touching the curtain and sending a shiver through the thin material, Laura did her best to keep taking deep breaths. Cleansing ones to wash the insults out of her ears but truth be told it was getting harder and harder.

“How can any of these girls be a match for you? The dark beauty of the world’s rotting core?”

Laura had to clamp a hand over her own mouth to keep the gasp from getting out.   
Obviously, she knew that Mattie had seen Carmilla at her worst; at her most vicious and inhuman. And she had probably revelled in it too, given her own sense of bloodlust that was barely disguised under the surface of all those manners and propriety. Fed on the sight. 

But she had to know how much those words would hurt her sister, didn’t she? It’d be so easy to think that she didn’t care about her at all... except that simply wasn’t true. For all her threats Laura could tell Matska Belmonde had missed Carmilla. Felt all kinds of affection for her however twisted it might be.

“She’s stronger than you think.”

Laura almost smiled at her girlfriend’s reply. At the sincerity in it. But that was before she realised that Carmilla had totally deflected the comment away from herself, as if she couldn’t bring herself to acknowledge the reality of what Mattie was saying. What she was implying.  
And the smile dropped from Laura’s face.

Carm only did that when she was injured and didn’t want anyone to know.  
And Laura never wanted her to have to hide things like that anymore. Not when she was around.

The rest of the conversation suddenly seemed to pass her by until the student heard heeled footsteps leaving the room and she was free to make her way out of the airless space.

Carmilla was sitting there nonchalant as ever but the way she said Laura’s name, in that chiding tone she had when she was hurting and didn’t have the energy to deal with anymore drama, made the blonde’s nerves fire.

“You heard her...”

She had so much she wanted to say. That needed to be said.   
About how Carmilla wasn’t that person anymore. And that it had nothing to do with Laura and their group of friends. That she had dug herself out of the dark pit she’d found herself in well before Styria University had even existed and every small thing she’d done since then, every doubt she’d had about her mother’s schemes, every action she’d undertaken even the smallest ones designed to piss Laura off had earned every second of redemption she’d found since then.

That she wasn’t bound to that ‘rotting core’ anymore as Mattie had so eloquently put it- she was free to live her own life and make her own choices. 

But somehow the words wouldn’t come out of her mouth.

Instead the anger that seemed to spring up whenever the chair of the board of Governors was around fizzled into life and she found herself rambling about Mattie’s plans, how they had to get down into the crater to work out what was happening. As if her whole body was planning its own little coup and had locked up all the things she needed Carm to hear had been pushed into a locked room inside that she couldn’t quite reach.

Laura could see Carmilla retreating from her even as she sat there less than a metre away.

And then Laura was out of the door before she even knew what was happening. With no time left to thank her girlfriend for choosing their side over her sister’s. For risking her life in having that little tete-a-tete when she hadn’t really wanted to do it at all.

For caring more about protecting Laura than risking the wrath of her family’s fury.

Again.

All these thoughts flitted through Laura’s head as they made their way down into the caverns below the Lustig and she reached out to hold Carmilla’s hand when she stumbled slightly. Carmilla steadied her of course but the usual warmth in her grip was absent as she pulled it away again and they carried on down towards the crater. And the tiny blonde knew that they couldn’t go on like this much longer- dragging the vampire into their crusade however righteous it might seem.

But they had things to do right now.

So that conversation would have to wait just a little longer.

It would all be ok though.

Right?


End file.
